BUIP034: Ecosystem Outreach for Onchain Scaling
Proposer: Andrew Clifford (solex)
Submitted: 2016-10-23
Status: ??
Summary
This is an Operational BUIP requesting BU membership approval of expenditures necessary to explain the BU vision in particular, and on-chain scaling goals in general, to decision-makers in as many of the Bitcoin ecosystem companies as possible. It is assumed that the full-node network is representative of the ecosystem business community. Many of these node owners will be receptive to the necessity to restart Bitcoin's network effect, which has been arrested since mid-2016. Improving the BU full node count is fundamental to a successful hard-fork when the hashing-power reaches the region of 75%.
Background
Polls taken in the 2013-14 period, during censorship-free times and an unbiased cryptocurrency news environment showed that business support for a hard-fork and onchain scaling was running >90%. This support was higher than polls of users which were usually in the region of 75-85%.
The existing capacity limit
constraining block-space has created a temporary situation of high fees,
where many users are priced away from Bitcoin.
This is unstable and market forces
will find a block-space supply substitution. Because of inertia this
does not happen immediately, but likely after a year the process will be
well underway. Fees in Bitcoin transactions will fall back to the
pre-capacity levels seen in 2015, while alternative cryptocurrency gains
a permanent foothold and ecosystem traction.
The conclusion of this process must be averted if Bitcoin is to succeed in the manner of the original vision.
Since mid-2015 a significant minority of businesses have become resigned to the prospect of the Bitcoin "farm" being bet on the "roulette wheel" of 2nd-layer off-chain scaling solutions. To protect their business model from the likely failure of over-dependency on 2nd-layer solutions many Bitcoin businesses are transitioning to a multi-cryptocurrency future, a typical example is Coinbase rebadging its exchange as GDAX and supporting ETH.
Ecosystem outreach
Bitcoin businesses need to be re-awakened to the alternative of restoring the original vision of supporting onchain scaling up to technological limits. Also, to see reaffirmation that market-driven solutions are best. i.e. that 2nd-layer solutions are welcome to compete for transaction volume with peer-to-peer onchain, but not in an adverse climate where onchain is crippled in the naive wish that users can be forced off-chain. Further, that many software improvements exist or will soon be developed so that Bitcoin transaction-handling capacity is potentially an order of magnitude larger than that seen today at 3tps.
At the date of this BUIP submission
the BU node count is 7% of the total (shown above), and still climbing
steadily. The principle objective here is to facilitate growth to and
beyond 50%. Importantly, this needs to be organic growth due to many
node owners making an informed choice, and representative of the
ecosystem. There is no economic footprint in multiple nodes on AWS run
by a single person.
Most outreach will be conducted via a combination of written communication and video-conference discussion.
Membership participation
The proposal here is to ask for volunteers from the BU members to help in the outreach program and personally make a visit to the companies nearest to them. Their expenses would be covered.
Expenditure
Budget: $30,000 over a three-month period commencing from the date of
vote (if successful).
Commitment of funds will not be made in a cavalier manner, only when it
is apparent that in-person discussions are a clear and necessary
advantage over the usual long-distance communication methods.
Governance
The elected BU officials: President, Secretary and Developer will jointly agree expenditures for outreach initiatives. The details of this are necessarily incomplete at this point as the process is an evolving one.